Free Denver Strike by Randy Wayne White Page A

blue-white snowy peaks of the Rockies, looming over the Denver skyline. The city made gray and silver concrete stalagmite shapes at the foot of the mountains.
    â€œHoly shit,” Tom Dulles exclaimed, releasing a great breath. “Is your life always this wild?”
    â€œI’m usually home every night with a good book.”
    Dulles hooted. “You don’t think I believe that shit, do you? Jesus, man, you’ve got balls made of grade-A granite! I can’t believe you just bullshitted your way in to see the great William Nek, the richest man in Denver, and then sat there and told the old fart you would destroy his entire empire if he didn’t cooperate. Jesus, did you see his face when you said it? I thought he was going to blow a tube in his brain. What a bluff you made!”
    â€œI wasn’t bluffing,” Hawker said quietly. “I meant every word of it.”
    Dulles looked dubious. “Look, Hawk, I don’t doubt you’re damned good at what you do. I mean, I know firsthand how good you can be! But be realistic. How can you destroy Nek’s whole empire?”
    â€œEasily,” Hawker replied. “Nek is a business. He’s insane, but he’s still a business. I can shake him up good on the outside, and I have an associate who’s so rich that he could buy and sell Nek. Believe me, my friend could find a way to turn the screws so tight on the so-called Silver King that he would never recover. That’s why I wanted to see Nek in person. It’s damned serious business. And when you think about it, this whole case is kind of a long-term domestic squabble. Four old friends have a fight fifty years ago. Bad blood continues. One of them—Nek—goes a little crazy. He wants to show his old partners how powerful he’s become, so he flexes some muscle.” Hawker shrugged as he steered the car north toward the heart of Denver. “I wanted to give him a chance to drop it. I wanted to give him a chance to poke his hands in his pockets and go shuffling back to the others and ask for their forgiveness. A sane person would have accepted my offer. Don’t think for a minute Nek really didn’t recognize my name. I saw the look in his eyes. He’s heard of me, heard of what my organization is capable of. But he’s gone too screwy. And I think he’s been screwy for a long time. I’ll bet if we had a way of getting inside information, we’d find out that Nek has used kidnapping and murder and God knows what else to intimidate people before. He’s got this weird, wild expression in his eyes. I’ve seen it before. I’ve seen it in the faces of psychopaths and kinks. That man has some screws loose, mark my words. He is a thoroughly dangerous man.”
    â€œHow clever of you to notice,” purred the voice of a stranger from the backseat. Hawker and Dulles both started as the precision lick-click of a revolver being cocked echoed in their ears. “Now, Mr. Hawker, if you are done philosophizing, kindly pull this car over to the curb before I am forced to shoot one of your ears off!”
    It was the husky, lubricious voice of a woman. He could see a choice rectangle of her face in the mirror: silky platinum hair, rust-colored, auburn eyes, waspish pug nose, delicate cheekbones, lips rouged pink on a mouth that now wore a slightly cruel smile.
    He felt the cool barrel of the snub-nosed .38 touch his earlobe.
    The vigilante saw a gravel berm, and he pulled over.
    â€œNow,” said the woman easily, “I want Mr. Policeman to get out of the car.”
    â€œWhat?” Dulles’s head pivoted to look at the woman. He smiled slightly when he saw how beautiful she was, but the smile vanished from his face when she leveled the revolver at his nose.
    â€œDid I say you could turn around, Mr. Policeman?”
    â€œLook, lady—”
    â€œNor did I give you permission to talk!” With his peripheral vision,